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Improved Documentation
This page is aimed to be an improved and corrected version (not a copy) of the official Sryth docs. It is needed because there are several errors, or at least misleading bits, in them, and they often cause serious blunders. However, there may be tips contained on the official Docs that have not been ported here, so new players are advised to read the official docs anyway. This page is not self-contained: it links liberally to other pages where the matters are explained in full depth. Take it as one of several wiki indexes. This page is spoiler-free. For a guide to get your character "up and running" as fast as possible you can check the Character Startup Guide. Warning: that one is full of spoilers and can diminish your enjoyment of the game (discovering things for yourself is fun) if used from the start, Getting started First, check an overview of the game, before creating your character. You should be aware that although Sryth is free to play, there's a high number of perks associated with being a registered member, what is called Adventurers Guild, or as you will most frequently see, just AG. On this wiki, content exclusive to AG members will be often marked To move around the game, check Game Display. Character Statistics Make sure you understand stats. Follow links from that page liberally, they will take you around most of the needed concepts. A notable thing to correct from the official docs is the assert "A value between 9 and 11 is considered "average". This is wrong. In fact, most adventurers out there (and all of the best ones) will have all their stats at 19-20. Many of them start already with all stats at 19 or 20, with the occasional 17 and 18. Opportunities to upgrade your stats will be scarce, so it's critical to get them right from the beginning. Check again Character Creation. A low stat is not the end, but will certainly make your life harder. * A low MR will hurt at the beginning of your game. * Low values of Aura, Mind or Spirit may prevent you from using powers. If that is the case you are advised to promptly delete your character (or roll another, better one). * Stats have a direct bearing on the XP Bonus. This concept is not critical for the beginning of the game, but it gets more and more important as time goes by, so better to address it from the start * Luck is both very important and very hard to raise. If you have to choose, choose a 20 in Luck above any other stat. * Despite what the description of Stamina Points says there are no skills and powers that increase Stamina Another correction to the official docs is that you'll never permanently lose stats (well, except a rare exception, Trithik's gaol), and there are very few items that temporarily lower them. Character skills Now you should get familiar with the nature and mechanics of skills and powers. Those will be your best resources during all of the game, and sometimes they unlock paths through the game you can't traverse without them. This is a good moment to introduce the concept of Experience (XP, tied with the XP Bonus we talke about earlier) ;Misleading bits about skills * Arcana does not improve your magical skill: it just serves to identify Unidentified Items, which often turn out to be magical in nature. * Archery is not used in regular combat, it can only be used in Skill Checks * There are no other mounts than horses, no matter what horsemanship says. * Thievery: There are no "further specialized rogueish skills", at least now. * Weaponry: You can learn and use weaponry subskills without having it. Also, the only skills beyond the 10 basic skills are the Weaponry subskills Character Powers Powers are a very important part of your arsenal. The Docs introduction to them is especially poetic. The rumoured sphere of magic beyond the ten basic ones is Shadow Magic. Powers also require XP to level up, roughly twice as much as skills, and as such the XP Bonus is especially important for them (even more so because there is a single XP Bonus for all powers) ;Misleading bits about powers * Gating: "A mage who is well practiced at Gating can often zap themselves about the world of Sryth as they please". This is not true, Gating does not allow any additional form of travel There is also an outdated note of "click the image of the die" to continue your power invocation. This is a very old mechanic, before the three types of attack were introduced. You can click any one of the three buttons to cast your magic (the damage you'll receive is in the Normal attack table, see combat). Items Items improve your stats, specially for combat. Some special items also unlock special game mechanics. You get items after some combats, during the course of quests, and from shops. Items are either weapons, armour pieces, or miscellaneous. Your might stat will determine your maximum encumbrance: how many items you can carry. The explanation of Items (especially about using/equipping them) is particularly useful in the official Docs. An exception: "unless you happen to come across a double-wield skill at some point in the future." There has never been such a skill. About dropping items: It's a good idea to get a dwelling as soon as possible. Remember that dropped/sold items are gone forever. Luckily, most quest items come undroppable from the start. You can also mark an item "Non-Droppable" to prevent accidentally dropping or selling it. Items also provide one of the main ways to earn gold. All shops buy your items for less than their real value (often for much less), but that cannot be helped. However, you can get a lot of gold by selling at the correct place. See loot and Item Selling Guide for details. Monsters and combat Now for the combat. Most of your challenges in quests will be combats. On the Combat page you'll find everything you need to know about to-hit numbers, special attacks, and using powers in combat. The explanation on the official Docs is also quite good. Just adding that if you lose a combat you may die, but luckily death in Sryth is never permanent! Almost harmless, provided you have saved recently. You can save on any location on the game. Playing the game ;Adventures Now you will be asking, what are those quests I'm hearing about all the time?. Well, quests are the main part of the game. More or less everything you can do in Sryth, apart from traveling, buying and selling, and speaking to NPCs, is a quest. Quests are the game adventures, but we also use "Adventure" for a special kind of quest: the one you get from a "Adventures for this location" link. The main index of quests is the Quest List. On the official docs there is an explanation about abandoning adventures. This is an outdated mechanic. To abandon an adventure, just Quit without saving. ;Map Nowadays, all characters (except one particular Pre-Generated one) start with the Enchanted Map. There are no other magical mapping devices in the game. In this context, "very high levels of thievery or woodsmanship" means at level 50 you start to see the question marks in the graphical maps. ;Misc tips Take care when fleeing during a quest. Some quests (and some great rewards on some quests) are extremely easy to miss due to a bad decision or turn in the road. If you can't beat a combat, it's sometimes better to let yourself be killed, or Quit without saving, than endure the loss. More reading Have you read everything? Check the Important Game Concepts page and the Game Concepts category to keep learning about Sryth. Category:Game Concepts Category:Indexes